Abstract
Activation of G protein-coupled receptors like the beta(1)-adrenergic
receptor results in conformational changes that ultimately lead to
signal propagation through a G protein to an effector like adenylyl
cyclase. In this study we identified amino acids that seem to be
critical for activation of the human beta(1)-adrenergic receptor.
Activation patterns of mutant receptors were analyzed using two structurally
different ligands for beta-adrenergic receptors that both are mixed
agonist/antagonists. Broxaterol and terbutaline are agonists at beta(2)-
and beta(3)-receptors; however, they act as antagonists at the beta(1)-subtype.
We reasoned that this functional selectivity may be reflected by
a corresponding sequence pattern in the receptor subtypes. Therefore,
we exchanged single amino acids of the beta(1)-adrenergic receptor
for residues that were identical in the beta(2)- and beta(3)-subtypes
but different in the beta(1)-receptor. Pharmacological characterization
of such receptor mutants revealed that binding of a panel of agonists
and antagonists including broxaterol and terbutaline was unaltered.
However, two of the mutants (I185V and D212N) were activated by broxaterol
and terbutaline, which acted as antagonists at the wild-type receptor.
Two additional mutants (V120L and K253R) could be activated by terbutaline
alone, which is structurally more closely related to endogenous catecholamines
like epinephrine than to broxaterol. A model of the human beta(1)-adrenergic
receptor showed that the four gain-of-function mutations are outside
of the putative ligand-binding domain substantiating the lack of
an effect of the mutations on binding characteristics. These results
support the notion that Val-120, Ile-185, Asp-212, and Lys-253 are
critically involved in conformational changes occurring during receptor
activation.
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